


I don't Know How To Handle This

by ariane221b



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Fluff, Friendship, M/M, Return, happiness
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-04-07
Updated: 2012-04-07
Packaged: 2017-11-03 05:51:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/378002
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ariane221b/pseuds/ariane221b
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock is finally back... He's there, on the doorstep. I don't know how to handle this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I don't Know How To Handle This

**Author's Note:**

> All of the Sherlock returns that I've read so far have all been quite angsty, or slashy, I thought it would be nice that showed them being happy together, and cuddly, and fluffy, and.... you get the idea. Hasn't been beta'd, so tell me if there are any errors. Enjoy! x

"I don't know how to handle this."

It's the only thing he can think of to say. In fact, he's not even entirely sure that he thought it. It's just the words that came out of his mouth, from the white noise, and blurry blackness that seem to be occurring inside his brain. For a fleeting moment there’s a feeling of giddiness, or nausea, or something and in the distant medical recesses of his brain, John wonders if he will pass out.

And then there’s this hand on the top of his arm, gripping him, a little too tightly so that he can feel finger tips pressing through the fabric of his shirt. The hand shakes him slightly, and he can hear someone calling his name, but it sounds far away, like he’s underwater. 

And then suddenly everything turns clear again, and his brain seems to have gone onto fast forward, rewind, playback, pause, no, reverse, rewind. He looks at the face of the man in front of him, a face which he hasn’t seen in outside of dreams and distant memories for three years. Three years ago, when the last time he had seen him was to be lifted onto a stretcher, blood still fresh, matting his hair together, no light behind his cold, grey eyes. The eyes that had lit up when they had met John’s, and danced when John had smiled at him; his only friend. 

The hand has left his shoulder, which aches slightly, and has done for a while. He rubs one hand roughly over his face, and remembers he forgot to shave that morning. He feels slightly self-conscious of his bare feet, and the holes in his t-shirt, but that doesn’t matter.

Because he’s not dead.

And how is that even possible? People don’t just un-die. It’s medically, physically and thanatologically incorrect. Once you’ve died, you are dead, whichever way you look at it. And this man, it seems, is not. But of course it’s not. Because when did this man ever conform to the norms of medics, physics or thanatology. 

He’s been staring for quite a long time, and this man, this inhuman man, has been staring back. He feels calmer now; calm enough to speak real words, but the only one he can manage at that moment in time is “Sherlock.” And the only one the other man can manage is,

“John.”

And Sherlock reaches out for him, and gathers him up in his arms, and they wrap themselves around each other, and John’s laughing, while tears stream down his face. He feels Sherlock burying his face into the join between his neck and his shoulder, and he does the same, breathing in the smell of his best friend, both the same and so very, very different to what he remembers. 

There’s still that something that is, at best, Sherlock. It’s earthy, and soft, and a little like cashmere, and there’s the usual smell of tea, toast, and he can smell Mycroft’s house. Then there’s the new stuff, like different shampoo, and cold, and blackcurrant and for some reason something that smells like the little syrup cakes that he and his friends used to get from his local Indian takeaway when he had been at uni.

Eventually, John pulls back, and holds him at arm’s length. Sherlock looks remarkably worried, which is endearing, because it’s not an expression which John has seen a lot on the consulting detective’s face. “You should come inside.”

“Are you sure?”

“What are you talking about you daft git, of course I’m sure.” 

“I thought you would be… you know, angry.”

Now Sherlock looks, if anything, confused, and John just shakes his head, and reaches out to drag him inside by the sleeve, and shut the door behind him. “No, I’m not angry. I’m confused, and happy, and overwhelmed, but no, I’m not angry.” 

He automatically leaves Sherlock in the living room, and goes to put the kettle on, because if there was any good excuse for tea, it was your best friend coming back from the dead. He stands in the doorway of the kitchen, and watches Sherlock move around the small space, looking incredibly out of place. John’s new flat was rather much smaller than Baker Street had been, and the furnishings were much sparser, falling back into the old army habits which Sherlock had initially thrown out of the window with his tendency towards mess. 

He can practically hear Sherlock’s brain working as he takes in his new surroundings. 

_Yellow mud on insole of left shoe, most likely from the road works on Pickering Road, so he’s back working at the surgery.  
Nice jacket on hook behind door, dry, smudge of sauce on sleeve. He went on an unsuccessful date… ten, no, twelve nights ago to that nice Italian on Covent Garden.  
Cane by door, his limp is back, but he forgot about it when I came in.  
Nice cushion on sofa, but he wouldn’t buy that. A relationship… eleven months long, eight months ago. She left him, just before they moved in together.  
Photo on the fourth shelf up of the bookcase. Of…oh. Of us. The photo that Lestrade took outside The Crossed Keys. We look so… happy._

For once, John is glad Sherlock can read people like he can. It saves having to tell him what the last three years have been like, which is good. 

He watches Sherlock investigating every point in the room, trying to decode as much as possible. He pauses at the small chest of drawers in the corner. _Two top drawers free of dust, used regularly, marks of use around edges, bottom drawer, layer of dust, hasn’t been opened in three years, judging by the level of cleanliness in the rest of the flat. Three years ago…_

John hears the kettle boil, and goes back into the kitchen to make tea. He hears the noise of the bottom drawer being opened, a little squeaky from lack of use. He does not want to watch Sherlock open that drawer, and he does not want to see his response as he looks inside. He knows very well what he will find in there. 

_Skull… scarf… gun… violin… a note that read ‘Crime in Progress, please disturb’ , that he had once pinned to the front door…the sodding, god be damned deerstalker._


End file.
